Bilateral Stimulus & "Tapping"

When working with an EMDR therapist you will often hear the term “bilateral stimulus” or BLS used. BLS is simply anything that stimulates the two hemispheres of your brain back and forth, left-right-left-right, etc. You probably remember from school that each hemisphere of your brain controls the opposite half of your body, so any activity that stimulates your body from side to side can count as BLS. In fact, every time you walk or run, you are using BLS. Common sources of BLS in EMDR Therapy include visual (eye movements, like watching a prompt on a screen scroll back and forth), auditory (wearing earbuds or headphones while sounds switch from left to right repeatedly), and tactile, sometimes through small plastic “tappers” that are held in each hand and vibrate back and forth.

In EMDR therapy, BLS is used in two main ways:

Slow BLS is primarily used to enhance resources and positive feelings. Slow BLS is often used after the installation of a Calm Place or Container exercise, and you can even use it when thinking about positive memories to strengthen the links between the memories and the comfortable sensations in the body. Slow BLS seems to help create stronger, more robust links in the brain.

Faster BLS is most often used in more clinical approaches like reprocessing traumatic memories, triggers and other materials. It encourages the brain to make many, many links, and will help your old, traumatic memories to create new links to information and experiences you’ve had since that old memory. This will help your brain to make those old memories more adaptive so it can let go of uncomfortable feelings and sensations, helping you to feel better even when you think about those old memories.

An easy way to utilize BLS yourself is by “tapping,” i.e. stimulating each side of your body back and forth by tapping on yourself. For example, while sitting straight but comfortably, let your hands fall naturally to sit on top of your legs, somewhere between your knees and your hips. Use your fingertips to tap on your legs, back-and-forth, left-to-right, at a nice, slow tempo. Another common technique is the “butterfly hug”, where you wrap your arms across your chest and tap back and forth on your opposite shoulder or upper arm. The important thing to remember about self-administered BLS is that you should keep it nice and slow, and should stop any time you begin to feel uncomfortable. Uncomfortable feelings are a sign that your brain is starting to reprocess, and—unless you are instructed otherwise—this should always be done in the presence of a therapist. But as long as you are having comfortable feelings, you can utilize slow BLS as often as you like.

#BLS #EMDRTherapy #Trauma